Personally, I though the problem with Superman Returns was that it was one of those "director's passion projects" movies. Bryan Singer is a huge Superman fan and always wanted to do a Superman fan, and what we end up with is two and a half hours of fanboy gushing. We had the same problem with Peter Jackson's King Kong. These are fine examples of why it's a bad idea having a fan calling the shots, even if said fan is a professional filmmaker.

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Jackson's King Kong makes mincemeat of the shitty 1976 film, and was just what people needed to banish that abomination away. That fact that most people didn't get it is to their detriment, not Jackson's.

Although, while Abrams might in principle be the best choice direct Trek, I still don't think he specifically is the right choice, based on my own opinions of him as a filmmaker. And really, starting every interview off with "I'm more a Star Wars fan than a Star Trek" borders on being quite an asshole.

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If you don't think that he was the right choice, then who exactly should have been that choice? Something bold was needed, and Abrams was the person to make that choice.

If you don't think that he was the right choice, then who exactly should have been that choice? Something bold was needed, and Abrams was the person to make that choice.

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Someone who isn't obsessed with lens flares and leading zeroes. Someone who knows how to keep a camer standing still for longer than three seconds and doesn't have everyone talking over each other all the time. Someone who could deliver a story that was something more than "the epic battle between an octopus and a jellyfish."

But you're right, in order to make Star Trek comercially viable it had to be done as a by the numbers summer blockbuster with all its tropes. I accept that even if I'm not too happy about it. I liked Star Trek before it was commercially viable.

If you don't think that he was the right choice, then who exactly should have been that choice? Something bold was needed, and Abrams was the person to make that choice.

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JJ Abram's may end up being the best illustration of my answer on this - though we will need to see how the old Star Wars episode VII turns out, why? Because of his statements to the effect that "Star Trek" was just a job while "Star Wars" is a dream come true.

Whether the next person charged with extending the Trek franchise is a name with fanboy cache or not is immaterial. What is in important is how much they believe in the property. First and foremost, they have to believe in it.

Whoever is given charge of "Star Trek" must embrace and uphold the integrity of its internal reality. In retrospect, I believe, we can discern the good, bad and indifferent Trek films by that standard.

For example, Robert Wise (a legendary talent) did not have a real feel for the material. The Motion Picture suffered because, despite his ability, he tried to overcome his unfamiliarity and disconnect by forcing it to transform into something it wasn't in order to make it more comfortable.

Now, JJ Abrams is another talented director. I mean there is no doubt that he knows his stuff on a technical level. There is no doubt he loves directing. On top of that love of duty and craft he is downright great at both. But, to me, he doesn't really come across as believing in the world of Star Trek required to give the wooden boy a soul.

Don't get me wrong, the last "Star Trek" film was a fun, slick romp. A technical triumph. Abrams knows how to manipulate his audience like few others, but in a generic, almost cynical way. It is not a secret that there are recipes out there for how to make an entertaining film. There is a rhythm to it and if you are in-tune with mordern audiences you can crankout some chart-toppers one, two, three. They maybe be bubble-gum and hollow but they'll make you money.

My favorite Star Trek films (II, III, IV, VI) had an organic quality to them that resulted from an emphasis on character and chemistry (though with a side-order of action). These films were nurtured and grown rather than the results of artificial insemination. The problem with I, V, VII, IX, and X, as I see it, was simply that TPTB felt they could take short-cuts and fake the sincerity.

Look at Star Trek: Nemesis - that one failed simply because everything about it smacked of a test-tube created regurgidation of "The Wrath of Kahn." I mean after 7 seasons of production those in-charge could find nothing in TNG's history to play off of? Then we get Brent Spiner, Pat Stewart and the rest going to "cons" scratching their asses in confusion as to why folks, for the most part, didn't embrace their big-screen adventures.

Guess what, the one motion-picture the audiences did love from the TNG group was "First Contact," why? You guessed it ... it was culled and cultivated from their unique history and played to the characters and the relationships we loved. It was sincere. It was honest. It was real.

Anyway, on a different note: for fun last night I watched the Khitomer battle from STVI and the Kelvin scene of ST '09 back to back. They seemed pretty much the same to me. Glitzy action, things blowing up, similar music, etc.... I think some things haven't changed, despite the spin people are trying to put on this argument.

For example, Robert Wise (a legendary talent) did not have a real feel for the material. The Motion Picture suffered because, despite his ability, he tried to overcome his unfamiliarity and disconnect by forcing it to transform into something it wasn't in order to make it more comfortable.

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To be fair, TMP had far worse problems than Robert Wise's unfamiliarity with Star Trek.

It isn't so much the zero itself as it is the pointlessness of inserting a leading zero to make a four digit number when Star Trek has had plenty of three digit registry numbers. By all canonical precedents, the Kelvin should have been NCC-514, not NCC-0514.

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There's a lot I don't like about the new Star Trek... but come on a freaking zero. Stop being silly.

Has Star Trek changed? Obviously it has. Abrams flat out said he was brought in to transform it to appeal to populism. A guy named Lucas proved that pointless space action sagas sell, and it seems to me Abrams emulated that quite well. I can't say I much care for his product so far(I'll be pleased if I end up eating my words after Into Darkness), but a lot of other people do and it is introducing the franchise to more people, whatever else.

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There's a lot I don't like about the new Star Trek... but come on a freaking zero. Stop being silly.

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The sad thing is, the zero only started as one of many complaints I made when Trek XI info first became available. But since that was the one everyone jumped on me over, that's the one I ended up discussing the most and thus it became my thing to the extent that even I do parodies of myself in regards to it.

[To be fair, TMP had far worse problems than Robert Wise's unfamiliarity with Star Trek.

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To clarify, I believe had Robert Wise been more familiar, confident and in tune with the source material then Roddenberry's influence would have been diminished resulting in a better film.

I also really, truly hate to say it, but Robert Wise (a brilliant and fantasticly talented person) was not right, in my opinion, for this particular project (ST:TMP). I say that wishing I had one iota of his skill and ability as an artist and visionary.

When you get down to it, TMP is just two and a half hours of people staring at and reacting to funky colours. It doesn't matter how familiar with the source material the director is, there isn't really much any director can do with that kind of script.

Hell, even Roddenberry himself ended up filling his novelization of the movie with all kinds of weird and off the wall ideas which had nothing to really do with the movie. Like "love instructors"...

When you get down to it, TMP is just two and a half hours of people staring at and reacting to funky colours. It doesn't matter how familiar with the source material the director is, there isn't really much any director can do with that kind of script.

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But it is still better by far then Generations, Insurrection and Nemesis.

Hell, even Roddenberry himself ended up filling his novelization of the movie with all kinds of weird and off the wall ideas which had nothing to really do with the movie. Like "love instructors"...

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Have to chuckle about that. I remember people (me included) going batshit because he included those rumors of a Kirk/Spock romance.

Odd how Roddenberry went on kill David Gerrold's TNG script that dealt with homosexuality (even though it had already been alluded to in TOS with George Takei swashing buckles in the "Naked Time" as well as his wide-eyed appreciation of the gun's phallic form in "Shore Leave").

With something like 526 hours between TNG, DS9 & VOY and 4 cinema outings from the 24th Century, I'll admit to still wanting a much better farewell to that era, than Nemesis. But ultimately it would still be farewell. A nostalgic round-up of characters, two months before retirement, to remind me of the good times we had during the 1990s.

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I don't even want that. I want new and fresh characters in the post-TNG era. Admiral or Ambassador Picard may show up if he wants to. But that's it.

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^^^

I'd LOVE this and have been wanting it for years and years, but I doubt it would happen anymore outside of perhaps a novel series.

It won't happen. Star Trek as you have known it before is now dead. You have ten movies, 726 episodes, hundreds of novels, magazines, comic books, and so on. From 2009 onward, a new Star Trek has been created, and while it keeps some of the ideas from the first incarnation, it is it's own entity; it's own identity. There will be no returning to the previous incarnation. Enjoy what you have, because that's it.

When you get down to it, TMP is just two and a half hours of people staring at and reacting to funky colours. It doesn't matter how familiar with the source material the director is, there isn't really much any director can do with that kind of script.

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But it is still better by far then Generations, Insurrection and Nemesis.

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Insurrection, maybe. But not Generations and Nemesis. I watch both movies a lot more times than I do TMP. In fact, since 2005 I have watched Generations 4 times, Nemesis 6 times, and TMP only 3.